Given that Ed and I have both done some travelling in our pasts, we were not totally thrown for a loop when we arrived. Everything here in Aix seems to take just a few steps longer than one might anticipate. The apartment itself is up on the top floor, which is not too much of a problem. That is unless I forget my wallet and have to reclimb all those flights of stairs. Or when Noah looks up and proclaims that his little legs are finally, just now, too tired to make it to the top.
We are still working to register ourselves here in Aix. We went to the prefecture (sort of a police station) to turn in our paperwork. But the next step appeared to be to go down to Marseille to have a Marseille representative witness us signing the papers. But, after a bit of convincing, we decided to go back to the prefecture here in town to try our luck here, and to see what we were told. I walked ahead with Noah, to get our numbers in line while Ed and Julian and Micah made photocopies of our documents. Noah and I leapt around all the vigorous and seemingly blind-to-pedestrians construction workers and showed up at the front doors of the prefecture. The large doors were totally shut. A mail carrier rang the bell and a matronly bureaucrat peeked her head around the corner. Closed. Looking on the door again, it turns out that they were closed because of the construction. And then on Thursday for the National holiday. And on Friday because there was a holiday the day before. All very logical. All giving me pause, as we were supposed to register within eight days of arrival. Let’s hope that the first trip that started the paperwork was enough to “count,” or that the days that the prefecture was closed somehow don’t count in a bureaucrat’s method of counting. We will return Monday to try again.
Ed is also struggling to receive his boxes from work. Lots of email messages have gone around. Phone calls made, faxes sent. We had to get a cell phone in order to be able to be contacted to go and pick pu the boxes, but let’s just say that except for our landlady calling to invite us out to the countryside with her daughter’s family, the phone has remained quiet.
Even the recreational parts of our adventures take just a bit more. We wanted to go up to the dam in the mountains for a hike the other day. We found the bus station and bought our tickets. It actually turned out that they were the same tickets as the regular bus system, of which we already had 30 rides worth of tickets. Make that now 40. We found the right bus, waited for it to show up on the holiday schedule, and climbed aboard. Yes, this was the bus to the Barrage du Bimont. We settled in for the ride. But we kept going and going and going, past the canp where we had picnicked last week, until we suddenly had the sinking feeling that we had gone too far. The two backpackers in front of us reached up and pushed a button on the ceiling of the bus. Oooops. One needs to signal the driver to disembark. Well, after discussing with the other passengers around us, we decided to go to the end of the line, have our picnic lunch there and turn around when the next bus went back down the mountain so we could get off at the dam this time around. We arrived in Vauvenargues and ripped out the bread and cheese. After four boys and their mother finished gobbling down their meal, we all looked up. What a cute town!
Vauvenargues is a town of a single street. Apparently, apart from a small dip during the World Wars, the population has remained fairly steady around 500-700 residents. The buildings are so beautifully maintained, colorful and well-painted, and just oh-so-cute. Walking through, there is a (closed) office of tourism to which we vowed to come back to visit. Walking along even further we get to the end of town, to the parking lot (no room for cars to park along the streets). At the end of the lot, lo and behold, there is a trail map! Changing plans yet again, we decide to have our hike here and set off at once. The mountain is incredible and it totally brought back memories of hiking in Spain (I think in Grenada). The wildflowers were stunning in their array, and I was so surprised to find wild thyme, wild lavender, and even what looked to be wild orchids. And my favorite named conifer, Juniper. We enjoyed the afternoon sunshine and then turned around, had a lemonade and a little snack and caught the bus all the way to one block before our street.
It is amazing to me the process of letting go. It is such a common thing to aim for, at least a frequent hope of mine, but it feels so novel to try to be more open to experiencing the options that appear, rather than sticking with a planned agenda just because that was the initial conception of the idea or outing. I know that we are so super fortunate to be able to be on holiday right now in Aix, and that as more scheduled times come, the opportunities for spontaneity will lessen. But I am truly enjoying being able to take my steps, one at a time, and making a new decision as I step onto each landing. It hearkens me to each individual time I have travelled, and I have to say I am so grateful, full and content to be able to have this lightness in my life right now.
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